


Snowbound

by MissMorwen



Series: BuckyNat Prompts [26]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: BuckyNat Secret Santa, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Not Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Compliant, Pining, Sharing a Bed, still not over the damn pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-01-08
Packaged: 2021-02-19 07:16:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22173850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissMorwen/pseuds/MissMorwen
Summary: After finishing off a cup of the worst instant coffee he’d ever had, and after catching Natalia glance at the couch for the second time, Bucky nodded at it. “You take the couch. I don’t need much sleep.”She shot him a crooked smile. “It’s a pull-out sofa, you don’t have to play the martyr.”*************Prompt: Bucky and Nat huddled by the fireplace at night after making snow angels in the fresh snow.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Natasha Romanov
Series: BuckyNat Prompts [26]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/438178
Comments: 11
Kudos: 94
Collections: BuckyNat Secret Santa 2019, superassassins in love





	Snowbound

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gr8escap](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gr8escap/gifts).



> That's right, I turned that sweet and fluffy prompt into a "There was only one bed" trope fest ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ (Hope you like it)

Bucky woke with a killer-headache and the taste of metal in his mouth. Every breath brought frigid air into his lungs. His skin stung and prickled. He struggled to sit up, his muscles slow to react to his demands. The world around him was made of white and shadows, it took a few blinks to make sense of it. It wasn’t the chamber, thank God, it wasn’t the cryogenic chamber. He was somewhere outside. Snow fell all around. The wind howled through the trees. There had been gunfire, an explosion—

He scanned his surroundings for Natalia. He couldn’t see her. Getting to his feet was difficult. His legs were numb from cold. Footprints around where he’d been laid out in recovery position. Drag marks leading towards him. Drag marks that were coming from what he could only assume was the location of the Hydra compound they’d been sent to take out. A single set of footprints leading between the trees to a familiar shape camouflaged by a white snowsuit. Relief flooded through him. Natalia was talking with some on the satphone, gesturing wildly, and appeared undamaged.

Thank God for small mercies.

“Nat—,” he started to say but stopped when she turned around and her face contorted with fury.

She said into the phone, “Hold that order. He’s up and responsive. I’ll report back later,” marched over to him, and thumped him in the chest hard enough to hurt. “If you ever, _ever_ , do something that stupid again I will have you tied up in so much in red tape, you can’t lift a finger without having to fill out fifty forms and get a personal approval from Fury.”

It was fine. Bucky didn’t mind her being angry with him if she was safe and sound. Besides, the blast door had taken the brunt of the blast. It wasn’t like he’d tried to shield her from the explosion with just his body. “Okay.”

“You could have died, you idiot.”

“But I didn’t. We both got out, none the worse for wear.”

“Have you looked at yourself?” Incredulousness dulled the sharp edge of the anger.

Bucky looked down his body. His jacket had a splatter of blood dripped down from above and he touched his face gingerly with his gloved right hand. The right side was caked with blood. Enough of it to be felt through the thick winter gloves. A sore spot above his eye with something sharp sticking out of it. It could be worse. The shrapnel hadn’t penetrated the bone, otherwise, he’d be in a lot more pain. His pants hadn’t fared much better. They were ripped and some of the fluffy interior of the suit sticking out. That would explain the cold legs. But still, a torn suit and a couple of scratches were a small price for not having to watch Natalia get blown up before he kicked the bucket, too, because of a stupid self-destruct mechanism. “I’ve survived worse.”

The anger flared up again, but she scrunched up her face, pinched the bridge of her nose, and said, “Have it your way. There’s an old hunting cabin about two clicks uphill from here. We can patch you up and wait for an evac once the blizzard to clear up.”

Wasn’t that just his luck? Being stuck on a mountain in the ass-end of nowhere was bad enough. It had to be with the love of his life who was no doubt anxious to get back to her sweetheart. It was his own personal nightmare. Bucky nodded and tried not to show how unsteady he was with his reeling head and numb legs. “Lead the way.”

She stared at him for a couple of seconds, then nodded once, turned, and began the trek through the snow.

~~~

The snow was coming down thick and heavy by the time they reached the hunting cabin. Bucky leaned against the door when he closed it behind them, glad to be out of the wind. Blizzard sounded about right. The interior of the cabin was as rustic as the outside, but it looked like someone had upgraded it twenty or thirty years ago. There was a tea kitchen in one corner with a wood-burning stove, a table with chairs, a couch, and a fireplace that Natalia was already stacking logs in to start a fire. The only other door in the cabin led to what turned out to be a bathroom. It had a composting toilet, a sink that drained into a bucket, and a shower that consisted of a larger bucket to stand in and a smaller bucket suspended under the ceiling for the water. About as off the grid as it got.

Since the cabin had no running water, he got two buckets from the kitchen and went back outside to fill them with snow while Natalia worked on the fire. They could melt one of them to use for water in the kitchen. He’d use the other to clean up in the bathroom.

The mirror above the sink gave him an even better idea of why Natalia had frowned at him. A half-inch of twisted metal stuck out of his forehead. A tentative poke told him that it was good and stuck in the bone. Well, his mom had always said he was too boneheaded for his own good. Good thing she’d been wrong about that. He cleaned the caked blood off his face with the snow but left the shrapnel where it was as the wound began to bleed again when it tried to remove the metal. Better to find something to bandage it up with first.

His upper body had been covered by the blast door he’d used as a shield to protect them from the explosion and it showed. No damage to it other than the bloodstain. The pants hadn’t been as lucky, removing them took more work. Bucky leaned against the wall and inched them down carefully to not snag them on shrapnel sticking out of his legs. Once he got the snowsuit pants off, the full extent of the damage became apparent. He looked like he’d run through barb wire in his thermal long johns. The fabric hung in tatters from above his knees to his boots, but most of the cuts were shallow and quickly cleaned with the snow. The pieces of shrapnel that were left were easily removed and the snow helped stem the fresh blood. Minor damage that looked worse than it was. He was a fast healer, most of the cuts would be gone in a week. He’d need to stitch up the cuts in the suit unless he wanted to be stuck in the cabin until the evac came, though.

Natalia had located a first aid kit when he came out of the bathroom. She stared at him incredulously when she saw the shredded long johns. At least they were black. The blood they had soaked up was pretty much invisible.

“I guess ‘resistant to explosions’ was too much to ask for in a snowsuit.” He tried to play it off like it was a joke. He wasn’t gonna admit to any more damages than he absolutely had to.

A shadow moved across her face, too fast for Bucky to read it. “You should have said something.” Her voice sounded off. Stilted.

He shrugged one shoulder. “Can I—uh?” He gestured at the first aid kit on the table behind her.

She looked at him, then pointed at a chair and said, “Sit down,” with a tone that didn’t leave room for him to argue.

He sat still as she cleaned around the cut on his forehead with antiseptic swabs and then held a wad of gauze underneath it while he pried the shrapnel free. He pretended not to hear the steady stream of Russian curses she muttered under her breath while she stitched the wound closed and bandaged it. Tried hard not to think about how she used to touch him when he wasn’t a dirty secret from a best-forgotten past.

When she was done, she asked, “How’s your head feeling?”

“It’s fine.” It wasn’t a lie. Sitting down somewhere warm had done wonders to it. He hardly felt dizzy anymore.

“You were out for several minutes, Barnes. You’re not fine.”

“It takes a lot more than that to kill me,” he said to ease her worries.

“How do you know? You’re not as invincible as you think.” The skin around her eyes was tight, her mouth a thin line.

He remembered then what Steve had told him about the first time the Avengers had got together. How worried Natalia had been when Barton had been taken over by Loki. Bucky didn’t mean as much to her as Barton did these days, but he was still a teammate. Of course, she worried. “I was dizzy for a while, but I’m a fast healer. Nothing can keep me down for long.” He smiled at her, tried his best to make it look comforting.

She only frowned in return, then stood, and said, “I’m going out to get more wood for the fire. We’ll be here all night with that blizzard. Need to stay warm until then.”

He nodded and got up to check the kitchen cupboards for something to eat. Didn’t look back before he heard the door close behind her.

There were two cupboards filled with canned food and dry stuff like flour, chocolate, and powder milk and eggs. Enough to last them a few days and he picked a can of peaches to replenish his reserves. They went down quickly. After he’d finished them, he went to the window to see if he could see Natalia. No such luck. Beyond the porch, the world was lost in the snow. Couldn’t even make out the woodshed anymore.

To make use of her absence, Bucky went back to the bathroom, peeled the shredded long johns off, and set to work on his legs, cleaning the cuts with antiseptics and bandaging a few of the deeper ones.

She still wasn’t back when he was done.

What was keeping her? The shed was thirty feet away from the cabin. But it was no use worrying over nothing. As thick as the snow was coming down, she wouldn’t get lost in it. Even if a few Hydra agents had escaped the self-destruct, she could take care of herself. Always had. Bucky dug out a sewing kit, he’d spotted by the first aid kit and took a seat by a window to begin mending his torn pants. He’d need them if he were to convince Natalia that they could walk out of there instead of waiting for an evac team. Plus, he liked being able to feel his legs when hiking down a snow-covered mountain.

He had mended a few of the larger rips by the time Natalia finally returned. He recognized her footsteps the second she stepped onto the porch. The ball of her feet hitting the snow-covered wood before the heel. Like a dancer still.

The look she gave him when she saw him bend over his pants was indecipherable, but he pretended not to notice and only nodded at her before he got back to work. Stitching through two layers of the weatherproof shell with fluffy insulation between was fiddlier than it had been to mend his torn uniform back when he was part of the Howling Commandos. He should have paid closer attention to his mother when she had mended his and the rest of the family’s clothes.

After a while, she went over to set down the wood by the fireplace, and said, “I put up some snares. We might have fresh meat to eat tomorrow if we’re lucky.”

That made him look over at her again. “I’d hoped that ‘lucky’ would get us out of here.”

“Where would we go? Our quinjet is so much scrap metal, the nearest town is riddled with Hydra sympathizers, and I’m not walking seventy miles in a blizzard with your snowsuit torn up.” The hard edge from before returned to her voice word by word. “You’re just going to have to suck it up and live with not being able to run off for once.”

That stung. Bucky liked her company, he avoided it because he liked it too much. He nodded once, said, “Okay,” and returned to his attention to the torn pants. The sun was going down, the light disappearing minute by minute. He needed to work fast unless he wanted to risk stitching the wrong things together.

She was quiet for a while. Then he heard her move about before she came over to him, sat down, clicked on a flashlight, and aimed it at the rip he was mending. “Look, I’m sorry—” she started to say.

He cut her off. “You don’t agree with my methods and that’s okay, but they got us both out alive.”

“It’s not that. I’m not mad at you. I’m the one who rushed mission, believing we could get in and out before the blizzard hit. Hydra has been here for decades. It wouldn’t have hurt to wait a few days. Or even till the snow had melted.” Natalia sighed. “I’m the reason we’re in this mess, I shouldn’t take it out on you.”

He looked up, caught her eye, and deadpanned, “We all have our crosses to bear.”

The shift in her expression was almost imperceptible. Her gaze stopped ping-ponging all over him, and the faint frown smoothed. He wouldn’t have caught it if he hadn’t been watching her. Then he winked and her finely crafted mask cracked and fell away. She slumped on the couch, said with a sigh, “You are, without a doubt, the absolute worst.”

Bucky hummed in agreement and returned to mending his pants.

“I _am_ sorry, though.” She shifted on the couch again, keeping the flashlight steady as she pulled her legs up. “Maybe I’ll leave out of my report how you jumped in front of an explosion, so Steve won’t chew you up for it.”

“To be fair, he’d have done the same with his shield instead of a blast door.”

“To be fair,” she echoed, amused.

~~~

Bucky fixed dinner for them afterward. A couple of cans with chicken soup heated on the fireplace and canned peaches for dessert, all of which they ate by the light of the fire. There was a time when he’d have given his right arm to spend a night like this. Away from prying eyes, away from everything and everyone. Just him and Natalia.

Pointless to long for something that was no longer his to have.

After finishing off a cup of the worst instant coffee he’d ever had, and after catching Natalia glance at the couch for the second time, Bucky nodded at it. “You take the couch. I don’t need much sleep.”

She shot him a crooked smile. “It’s a pull-out sofa, you don’t have to play the martyr.”

 _Dear God, don’t make me. Don’t make me sleep next to her._ He tried to keep his reaction under control, but it must have shown on his face.

Her smile turned small and sad. “Relax, Barnes. I won’t bite.”

His mouth was bone-dry. “It’s just—” he began but couldn’t continue without saying something he’d regret. “I might freak out and hurt you.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that,” she said like she was invincible. Made of vibranium and not flesh and bones that could be easily damaged. That he had already damaged.

“I shot you. Nearly killed you.”

She stood, brushed invisible crumbs off her lap. “ _You_ didn’t. The soulless puppet Hydra created shot me. James Buchanan Barnes has never hurt me in his entire life.”

“I’ve hurt people without meaning to.” His parents by enlisting and never coming back while they were still alive. Steve by staying away after he began getting his memories back. Natalia by– by being born and by being stupid enough to believe that love between assets would ever be allowed in the Red Room.

She shrugged and left him with his unspoken words while she got ready for bed. Eventually, he got up and unfolded the pull-out sofa, smoothed the blankets over it till it could pass inspection from the harshest CO, and wadded up his jacket to use as a pillow. (And to mark the side nearest the door as his. Bucky didn’t care how old-fashioned that made him- He wasn’t gonna let her sleep closest to the entrance and away from the fire when he’d be awake all night anyway.)

She had unbraided her hair when she finally stepped out of the bathroom with her snowsuit bottoms and sweater draped over her arm, her boots unlaced and open. Looking like that, he could almost be fooled into believing her harmless. Small and curvy in her black thermal long underwear. The flickering light from the fire behind him turned her hair into burnished copper and erased the few lines time had etched in her skin since they first met. As if the decades in between hadn’t happened and she was still his Natalia.

Life seldom turned out as he wanted it to.

She moved past him without meeting his eyes and he went to the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face. The water was freezing with slush-like ice floating in the bucket and it killed any inclination to shower before bedtime. Wouldn’t have made much of a difference anyway. He’d still have to put back on the same thermal underwear he’d sweated and bled into a few hours ago.

When he returned, she’d already gone to bed, lying with her back to him and the rest of the cabin. Bucky pulled his sweater off and draped it over the chair with held his snowsuit, untied his boots, and went back to his side of the bed, pulling the corner the blankets back and slipped in under them. The light from the fire flickered on the ceiling above him, and next to him Natalia’s breath was quiet and too fast for her to be sleeping.

He shifted and his leg brushed up against something that could be a lump in the blanket or one of her feet. The one thing he didn’t account for with his choice of sleeping arrangements was that it forced him to sleep on his back. Sleeping on his left side was uncomfortable and sleeping on his right would have him facing Natalia which was just—

“Goodnight,” said Bucky to stop himself from thinking about how easy it would be to reach out and feel the warmth of her skin seep through her thermal underwear.

A sound like an exhale or a huff of laughter that got cut off, then, “Goodnight, Bucky.”

The fire crackled and popped in the silence. It was going to be a long night.

~~~

Bucky woke up slowly. The wind howled outside the cabin and inside it was even darker than when he went to sleep. The fire had died down despite the extra logs he’d put on it. He couldn’t tell what time it was. No light filtered in through the windows, but that just meant it was either in the middle of the night or early morning. Natalia stirred next to him, then whimpered like an animal in pain. He froze. Another whimper. He had never heard her make sounds like that. Not even that time in Tbilisi when a mark’s bodyguards had caught up with her and had beaten her within an inch of her life. (Not even when he’d been a passenger in his own body, forced to watch himself put bullets in her that he could only pray she would survive.)

She was curled up on the bed, her back turned to him. All he had to do was to reach out and shake her awake, but somehow it felt like an invasion of her privacy. Like he was seeing something that he wasn’t supposed to see. Moving carefully, he got up and went to the bathroom. The room was pitch black, but he navigated to the metal bucket that made up the bottom part of the shower without problems and banged his foot into it like he’d miscalculated his steps. He didn’t have to fake the curses, though.

Natalia was kneeling by the fireplace when he exited the bathroom, adding more logs to the fire.

“Did I wake you?”

She turned around. “Yeah.” Her face was unreadable with the only light in the room behind her, but her voice was soft.

“I’ll make breakfast to make up for it,” Bucky offered for reasons that weren’t entirely unselfish. It would give him something to do and it would stop his stomach from growling at him.

“I didn’t know you cooked.”

He folded his arms over his chest in a show of mock-offense. “Ma Barnes didn’t raise a slacker.”

“I bet she’d be proud.” Getting to her feet, she walked around the folded-out couch towards him.

He ducked his head. The thermal long johns didn’t have any pockets, so he wiped his hands on his thighs in lieu of shoving them in his non-existent pockets. “I’m not so sure.”

Natalia paused next to him, put her hand on the front of his good shoulder, said, “I am,” and disappeared into the bathroom.

 _L'esprit de l'escalier_ , Dernier’s voice echoed in his head. Well, yeah, maybe if there was a stairway long enough for Bucky to come up with something to counter that.

~~~

Making breakfast with only dry and canned foods available was a challenge. The field rations he’d been issued during the war had at least had meat in them. To make up for the lack of fresh ingredients, he went heavy on the satisfying and filling aspect of breakfast. In all, he made a small mountain of pancakes made without eggs or butter but served with plenty of maple syrup, scrambled eggs made with powdered eggs but sadly no bacon, and hot chocolate made with hot water, chunks of dark chocolate, and powdered milk.

After they’d finished eating, Natalia stretched like a cat, her back arching, her face a picture of satisfaction. “If you ever get tired of being a superhero, you could become the food blogging king of the doomsday preppers and get rich from the ad revenue.”

“It’s funny, I know what all of those words mean individually, but when you put them together like that, you’re not making any sense.”

She snickered. “I can see it already: Bucky Barnes – survivalist food blogger.”

“Dear God, no. I’d have to grow a beard and wear my hair in a bun.” He got up, collected the plates, and took them to the kitchenette.

“That’s hipsters, James. Doomsday preppers are the ones with a scruff and a distaste for buying trendy new clothes. Right up your alley.”

He was supposed to respond to the insult, but all he could think about was how she’d said his name. Like she was tasting the word. He looked over his shoulder at her. “James,” he repeated in a dry voice.

She shrugged. “I’m not calling you Bucky. It’s that or Barnes. Your choice.”

“James is fine, _Natalia_.” Without meaning to, he’d said her name in Russian. Old habits and all. He regretted it instantly, but it was too late to take it back.

She blinked and he turned his attention back to the dirty plates to avoid seeing disgust eclipse the amusement. Or even worse: hurt. He was a walking, talking reminder of everything the Red Room put her through just by being alive. No need to rub salt into the wound.

“I’m taking a shower,” said Natalia, her voice all wrong.

He nodded. Kept his eyes on the plates in his hands.

The big pot on the wood-burning stove had about two gallons of hot water left in it, but she went right past it.

He pulled on his snowsuit and laced up his boots. The buckets of dirty water needed emptying and refilling with fresh snow. It wasn’t the same as running away if going outside gave Natalia the privacy that she so clearly craved. And since he was already outside, he set about clearing the snow off the porch. It had piled up high during the night, almost barricaded the door. And so what if he was running away? He was allowed to be selfish once in a while.

With the porch cleared and a row of buckets filled with compacted snow lined up next to the door, Bucky decided to get some more wood from the shed. The only downside to his great escape was the weather. It was, to put it mildly, shit. Snow pricked his face like tiny needles. He had to squint to see without getting snow in his eyes and his attempt to mend his pants had done fuck all to stop the cold from getting through. He might as well be wading through the snow with just his boots on for all the insulation they provided. His legs had stopped prickling five minutes ago now they were mostly numb. The cold crept up his thighs as he waded through knee-high snow. _Suck it up, buttercup_ , he thought to himself and made his way to the woodshed, leaning back to pull his leg free from a particularly stubborn pile of snow.

The fall was far from graceful. And he was pretty sure he’d bruised his tailbone. “Ow,” he said and flopped onto his back.

The snow rustled as someone approached, foot treads nearly silent, circling his prone form. Familiar treads. Which—

A flash of red hair tucked inside a white parka appeared in his line of sight as Natalia crouched down by his head. Her sparkling green eyes made seemed greener with the white surroundings and her red cheeks. “Need help getting back up, old man?”

“Old,” Bucky scoffed. “You’re not exactly a spring chicken, either.”

She stilled, the smile slipping a little.

He’d read the SHIELD files she’d leaked. In all of them, her birth year had been listed as 1984. No one was supposed to know her real age. If only he’d learn to think before he spoke.

She disappeared out of view as she sat down hard enough to send up a puff of snow. “You _do_ remember.” It wasn’t a question.

“Not everything, but I remember you.” He wanted to tell her that she had been the only good thing after he fell. The one person who had seen him as anything other than a weapon and who had made him feel human again. But for once he managed to keep silent. She had a new life with a new love, and she didn’t need him whining about a past that was long gone. As long as Natalia was happy, he was happy.

She didn’t reply.

Before the silence became unbearable, Bucky pulled his leg free from the snow, got up, and brushed himself off. He turned around and saw the indentation he’d left in the snow. Oddly fitting. Funny.

“What?” Natalia said.

“Never seen a snow angel without wings before.”

She looked at him with an indecipherable expression. Then she said, “That won’t do,” circled around the wingless snow angel, carefully avoiding the area where he’d gotten his foot stuck and laid down in it. With a little wiggling, she aligned herself and gave his snow angel wings. “There,” she said with satisfaction.

~~~

They made their way back to the cabin without speaking.

After he’d pulled off his useless snowsuit and hung it up to dry, he turned to find Natalia looking at him. Droplets of melting snow in her hair caught the light like diamonds. She was made for this weather. Always made her seem more alive.

“Look, I—” She made a face. “For what it’s worth: I’m sorry I didn’t find you and get you out. It took seeing you outside Odessa to realize that just as the Red Room had lied and twisted everything else, then they’d been lying about you dying.” She smiled a bitter smile. “But that doesn’t excuse me not finding you after. I owe you to have tried harder.”

He tried to swallow but his mouth was dry. “You don’t owe me anything. Even if you did, you repaid it by vouching for me.”

The corner of her mouth twitched into a wry smile. “I think Captain America’s word probably carries more weight than mine.”

“Not with Fury. And I’m pretty sure not with Stark either.” Fury had been the biggest obstacle when Steve had talked him into returning to New York. Sure, Stark had been understandably reluctant, but Fury could have had him disappear from the face of the earth if he’d believed Bucky to be a real threat. He’d told Bucky as much himself.

“Maybe,” she conceded, then, “Help me with this, will you?” She went over to one end of the couch and started to lift it.

“Yeah. Yeah, of course.” He took up position by the other end lifted it, too. “What are we…”

“I’m teaching you to appreciate the finer things in life.” She shifted the couch away from the wall and nodded towards the fireplace. “This way.”

“Yeah?” It was impossible not to return her smile.

Apparently satisfied with the position of the couch facing the fireplace, she walked around it and dropped on to it. “Yeah.” Natalia patted the space next to her, stretched her thermal-clad legs out to warm them by the fire. “Starting immediately.”

He sat down and hooked his arm over the back of the couch so he could look at her and her quiet smile. “Not sure what this place counts as one of the finer things in life.”

“You’re looking at it all wrong. We have a fire to keep us warm, a roof over our heads, enough food to last us several days. And there’s an evac coming our way when the blizzard clears up. What more could you want?”

“Uh,” said Bucky. “Fresh food that isn’t canned or powdered. An ETA on that evac.” _You back in my arms_ , he thought but didn’t say.

Rolling her eyes in mock-annoyance, she pulled her legs up on the couch between them and draped her arm over the back of the couch in a mirror image of him. Her expression softened and she smiled a little ruefully, her eyes running over his face like over a map. “I wasn’t sure you remembered me. Remembered us. Until today.” She shook her head with a huff of laughter. “I should have just asked.”

“Shoulda said something.” His voice was rough, scratched his throat on the way out.

She smiled. “Shoulda, coulda, woulda. I’m glad you got out. I’m glad we both got out.”

“Yeah, me too.” The warmth from the fireplace had nothing on the warmth radiating from her eyes. If he twitched his fingers, they’d brush against hers. It was his left hand and though this new one was a vast improvement on the old arm, it didn’t register touch like his good arm, but he could use it to pull her closer. Kiss those soft lips again. Bucky swallowed. That wasn’t who he was. That wasn’t who _she_ was. He leaned back a little, said, “Don’t, uh, don’t worry. I won’t tell your fella about the bedsharing when we get back home.”

Natalia blinked. “My what?”

“Your— boyfriend, lover, whatever you call him. Barton.”

“Oh no.” She let her head fall back, covered her face with her hands. She shook with muffled laughter. When she looked at him again her eyes glistened, and she was smiling. “Is that why you always keep at arm’s length? Because you thought I was with Clint?”

“I didn’t want to intrude. I thought you were happy.”

“I’m happy because you are alive and well.” She began to laugh again.

What an idiot he’d been. “Well, shit.” He scrubbed a hand over his neck. “Coulda spend the time here doing more productive things if I’d known that.”

She quirked an eyebrow at him. “Yeah?”

He licked dry lips. “If you— if you want to.”

She took his left hand in hers, lacing her fingers between his metal ones, and brought it up to kiss the back of it. “You have no idea how much I want that.”

Emboldened, Bucky moved closer and used his free hand to smooth back the wisps of hair that that gotten free from her braid. She leaned into the touch, shivering a little and it was all he could do not to gape at her. He leaned closer. Their noses brushed, then finally, finally he had his mouth on hers and they kissed. Slow and gentle, Natalia’s hand resting on his chest.

First kiss in this century. First kiss in forever.

She shifted to move nearer, and he curled his arm around her waist and grinned against her mouth when she let him pull her across his lap. They had been apart for so long, he needed the weight of her to remind him that, yeah, this was real. This wasn’t just a cruel dream that would evaporate when he opened his eyes.

He wanted to resist when she broke the kiss, but she didn’t move away, rested her forehead against his and let out a blissed-out sigh.

“Hey,” Bucky said when she opened her eyes.

“Hey yourself.” Her voice was as rough as his.

His head was spinning, feeling drunk for the first time since Zola. She bit her bottom lip and he reached up to rub his thumb across it. “Pretty sure that’s my job now.”

She grinned, leaned back down, whispering, “Idiot,” into his mouth before she kissed him again. Softly and sweetly, her fingers clutching at his sweater in contrast to her apparently unhurried pace.

He didn’t need the finer things in life, he just needed her.

~~~

It took him a while to recognize the sound of a quinjet approaching, what with Natalia perched on his lap, warm and close and happy. He broke the kiss, buried his head in the crook of her neck. “You gotta be kiddin’ me.”

“What is it?” She tilted her head. “Ah,” she said. “The cavalry. Arriving late as usual.”

He looked up at her, tried to frown, but couldn’t muster it. “Arriving early if you ask me.”

Her eyes glinted with amusement. “I thought you couldn’t wait for the evac.”

“Yeah, well. That was before.” His hands settled on her hips where he found the top of her thermal underwear could be persuaded to let go of the bottom if he nudged it a bit. Her skin was soft and warm underneath. Bucky stroked it gently with his thumb. “You put up snares and everythin’.”

She shivered. “Such a waste,” agreed Natalia. “We should double-check the base, too. Make sure no one survived the explosion.” She traced a finger along his lips and the smile he couldn’t keep off his face.

“Can never be sure with those fuckers. They always pop up when you least expect it.” He had his entire hand under her top now, fingers curled around her ridiculously narrow waist, and he never wanted to let go again. Didn’t care that the quinjet had reached them and was landing outside the cabin.

“Might take a day or two.”

“A couple at the very least. If not more,” he countered.

She raised an eyebrow at that, and he shrugged in return. He hadn’t had a day off in weeks and if he knew her (and he did) the time since her last vacation could be counted in months. She grabbed the sides of his face and pressed a kiss to his lips that was over too soon to his liking. He cupped the back of her head and pulled her back in for another. The engine outside was only now powering down, the pilot had to lower the ramp before anyone would come looking for them. And make it through the knee-high snow.

Natalia’s lips were red when he let go of her, they curled up in a smile when she saw him looking at them. “Hold that thought.”

She slipped off the couch, pulled on her coat and boots, and went outside, while Bucky waited and did his best not to pace the small room.

A few minutes passed, then she returned carrying two duffel bags. She dropped them on the floor and pointed to each in turn. “Spare clothes and ammo. Meals, Ready to Eat and actual coffee.”

He grinned. “Did I tell you that I love you? ‘Cos, I do.”

“Harper said to call if we needed backup or a pick-up.” She shrugged out of her coat and kicked the boots off.

He caught her hand in his and tugged her back onto the couch. “Mm-hmm. Maybe next week.”

She straddled his lap, carted her fingers through his hair. “At the earliest,” she agreed and bend her head down to kiss him.

Being stranded in a cabin in the ass-end of nowhere might not be so bad after all.


End file.
